


Ten Times Doctor Rodney McKay Got Blind Stinking Drunk

by Losyark



Series: Rodney's Numbers [4]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: AU, F/M, M/M, Mary Sue, ish, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-02-14
Updated: 2008-02-14
Packaged: 2018-01-12 05:51:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1182658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Losyark/pseuds/Losyark





	Ten Times Doctor Rodney McKay Got Blind Stinking Drunk

One:

 

Getting back to his quarters from the lab, the first thing Rodney did was go to the bottom of his closet. The stale taste of the last of the vanilla caramel coffee made his teeth fuzzy. His stomach hurt. And not because of the caffeine.

 

Rodney re-read the letter he had written to Jenn. Just eleven words:

 

**God, I miss you. But I’m so glad you’re not here.**

 

He folded it carefully and put it in the inflated envelope he kept on his desk. It was already filled with other letters, meetings notes filled with stick-figure Kavanaughs and Zelenkas, and a half-decent doodle of a ‘jumper on a neon green post-it note, and a stick man with an arrow sticking out of his ass, and a pretty little pendant that Sheppard had traded a knife for in a market place when Rodney had admitted that he had forgotten to send something back for Jenn’s birthday.

 

The bottle of vodka he had hidden under the dirty socks was still where he had left it. Damn Siberia for making him like vodka, anyway. Rodney unscrewed the cap and chucked it out of the open balcony door.

 

He didn’t bother to listen to the sound of the tinny cylinder of metal pinging off the pier below.

 

He took a long, _deserved_ swig of the booze and did his best to forget.

 

* * *

 

Two:

 

“Jenn`ll never let ya live this down, ya know,” John said, poking Rodney in the temple.

 

Rodney swatted at John’s hand and missed wide.   “Cuttitout, Sheppard.”

 

“Never, never, never,” John sing-songed, shaking the half-empty bottle of Athosian moonshine as if it were a maraca.

 

“Don’ spillit!” Rodney snatched the bottle from John’s hand and took a swig, then pointed the bottle at his friend like a gun. “Isn’t fair. Wuz the drug. Ya can’t teller!”

 

John snorted. “Izzit true ya gave Lucius a massage?”

 

“Sheppard!”

 

“... in the nude...”

 

“ _Sheppard_.”       

 

He snorted and stole the bottle back. John drained a good inch off the top. “Why can’I? Drug`er no drug, like you say. It’s _sort_ of like cheating!” John pointed out. “Cheating with a _man.”_  


 

“It wuz sorta like _rape_ ,” Rodney pointed back.

 

That was a sobering, disturbing thought that had them both reaching for the bottle at the same time. They finished what was left in two neat pulls.

 

They sat in silence for a long, long time. If Rodney was crying, John said nothing.   He held his best friend around the shoulder, then pretended that it hadn’t happened the next morning, because that was exactly what Rodney wanted.

 

* * *

 

Three:

 

“Jenn?” Rodney said.

 

She was standing in the doorway of his bedroom, smiling gently. “Hey, Rodney,” she said, and held up a bag of coffee. Vanilla caramel. The good stuff.

 

“What the hell are you doing in Atlantis?”

 

“Well, fine!” she huffed with, _oh god,_ the sexiest little pout ever invented. “I’ll just go and take my coffee with me!”

 

“No, no!” Rodney said quickly and jumped up from his chair. He ended up knocking his tablet computer off the desk in the process, but the things were built to bounce.

 

Jenn leaned one hip against the doorframe, smirking, holding out the bag of coffee and shaking it teasingly. Torn between wanting to lunge at the coffee and wanting to pounce on his girlfriend, Rodney stood by his desk wringing his hands.

 

“Hey, are you all shy all of a sudden?” Jenn asked, and sauntered into the room. The door swished shut behind her, and Rodney was alone in his bedroom with the girlfriend he hadn’t seen in a year and seven months.

 

The bag of coffee hit the ground, but it didn’t burst so Rodney paid it no mind and instead concentrated on getting his tongue as far down Jenn’s throat as he possibly could in the shortest amount of time. She smiled against his mouth, tasting of chocolate lip gloss and ruined brownies, and Rodney palmed her ass, grinding his hips up.

 

Jenn leaned back her head and gasped and Rodney took it as an invitation to give her the biggest hickey in the history of big hickies. He mouthed his way along her jaw, broad, blunt fingers spreading at the delicious dip at the small of her back, hot under her shirt.

 

“Why...” Rodney asked around his sucking, shuffling backwards in the general direction he knew the bed to be, “are you...” his knees hit the edge of the mattress and he flopped down, bringing Jenn down on top of him with a happy little ‘oof’ of expelled air. “in Atlantis?”

 

Jenn sat up, one hand on his shoulder, fingers curling, nails digging ever so slightly, _oh god that’s hot_ , her pelvis straddling his. She shifted down, off his fly, dragging the material of his boxershorts across his arousal as the nimble fingers of her free hand went to work on his belt.

 

Rodney groaned, his eyes threatening to roll back in his head, but he wouldn’t let them, had to watch, hadn’t seen her in _so goddamn long_. With a tug she had Rodney freed from his clothing and in hand, proud and blunt and desperate.

 

“Wanna come on my hand?” she whispered into his ear and just that was enough for Rodney, who hadn’t had anyone’s hands on him but his own in _far too long._  


 

Rodney’s world shook apart, greying at the edges and flashing in the middle, warm and melted and _god_ purring. He opened his eyes, mouth a contented, lazy slash, expecting to see Jenn licking her hand clean or taking off her bra or even just watching his face as he came down.

 

What he saw was Acastus Kolya standing behind Jenn with a garrotte wire around her neck.

 

“What are you willing to do to keep her alive?” Kolya hissed. His dark eyes roved over Rodney’s body, paused at his split pants and rucked up shirt.

 

Jenn’s face was turning an alarming shade of purple.

 

Rodney swallowed once. “Anything,” he whispered.

 

“Build us nuclear weapons?”

 

“Yes. Please, let her go.” Rodney tried to sit up, but Kolya’s knuckles went whiter. Jenn made a high, wheezing sound and something inside of Rodney shivered all the way down.   He lay back down, hands out to the side, like a kitten submitting, on its back, the vulnerable parts exposed. “Yes! God, _stop_.”

 

“Give us a GateShip?” Koyla asked, all sharkish teeth.

 

“Yes!”

 

Kolya’s grip relaxed. Jenn’s eyes rolled up in her head, and she flopped down onto Rodney’s chest, gasping. A long line of bruising already coloured her neck and her eyelids fluttered. Rodney sat up, pulled her against his body for comfort and protection, petted the back of her head.

 

He reached up to touch his radio, and Kolya pulled back the hammer of his gun, pointed the barrel at Jenn’s head. Rodney dropped his hand back to Jenn’s hair.

 

“Move her onto that chair,” Kolya said. Rodney shifted so Jenn, unable to keep herself upright, barely conscious, was leaning against him and moved his hands to his belt. “Leave it,” Kolya ordered. “It suits.”

 

Rodney felt the colour drain from his face. He stood, humiliated, furious, cradled Jenn to his chest, and walked exposed and bare-assed to the chair.

 

“Tie her to it, use your belt,” Kolya said with a wave of his gun, and Rodney did what he was told.

 

“Put your hands behind you.”

 

Rodney did as he was told. There was a sharp tug and the click of wrist cuffs.

 

“Now, lean over the desk.”

* * *

 

He woke to Sheppard’s screaming, his own throat raw and dry. Someone was pulling their hand out of Sheppard’s forehead and Rodney wasn’t a genius for nothing and put it together.

 

Jenn was never on Atlantis, and neither was Kolya.

 

Nor had Rodney.

 

They had only been testing Rodney, seeing which relationships they could extort to make him do what they wanted. Testing him for information. To understand him. Like putting a rat through a maze to check reactions.

 

_Son of a bitch!_

 

“What’d they do to you?”  someone asked him, and Rodney ached to much to tell who.

 

“Torture,” Rodney said around the frog in his throat. “Horrible and intimate.”

 

Then things started moving again, and the city was in danger and Rodney needed to use his big brain to save the day instead of to think about things that would otherwise leave him royally fucked up.

 

Once Atlantis was safe Rodney tried to drink away the nightmares that were sure to come.

 

* * *

Four:

 

When John finally got out of the infirmary, looking younger than ever, the bastard, Rodney handed him a bottle of Zelenka’s moonshine and said, “So, now we’re making alliances with Wraith?”

 

“Not like it was the first time,” John said with a shrug, but something in his eyes went _snap_ , just a little bit.

 

“You.  Me.  Balcony.   Moonshine,” Rodney said, and this time it was Rodney’s turn to hold his friend as he had a drunken breakdown.

 

They had made a habit of saving each other’s lives. And each other’s sanity.

 

* * *

 

Five:

 

“What’s this?” Jeannie asked, looking down at the bottle of Athosian wine that John had set down on the dinner table between Jeannie and Rodney.

 

“Seeing as it’s your last night on Atlantis,” John said, placing three earthenware cups down beside the matching bottle, “I thought it was high time to introduce you to _Tennimer_.”

 

Jeannie blinked. “What?”

 

“Athosian wine,” Rodney said, scoffing. “I _was_ trying to have a family _moment_ here, Sheppard.”

 

“Would you rather spend your last night with your sister having awkward moments about being a jerk for four years--”

 

“ _Hey!”_  


 

“—or would you rather see Jeannie shitfaced on _Tennimer?_ ”

 

When Rodney hesitated answering, Jeannie leaned over and swatted his arm and John began to pour.

 

“Bet I could take you,” Jeannie said.

 

Rodney grinned. “I’ll take that action.”

 

* * *

 

Six:

 

Rodney checked his suit jacket one last time for stray lint, adjusted his tie, fluffed up the roses a little, and re-adjusted the bow on the bottle of _Tennimer_. Satisfied that he was as devastatingly handsome as ever, he rang the doorbell.

 

“Gimmie a sec! Coming, coming!” Jenn`s voice called through the door.

 

When she opened it she was damp, dishevelled, had soap in her hair, and was wearing nothing but a slipping towel.

 

“Uh…” Rodney said. “Surprise…?”

 

Jenn's face lit up like a fully-charged ZedPM.

 

“Surprise indeed,” she said, grabbed him by the lapels, and dragged Rodney into the apartment. “Welcome home.”

 

“Oh, yeah,” Rodney said.

 

* * *

 

Seven:

 

Rodney moved in. He put his back issues of science journals beside her copies of “Trigun” on the book shelf, his underwear in the drawer beside hers, and Mr. Jinx`s litterbox beside the toilet. He hid all of the video games that had anything to do with shooting aliens, stood in strange poses for hours in the evenings so Jenn could “get the line right”, and enjoyed the massages he got after to help work out the kinks from standing still so long.

 

He bitched at his sycophants, re-re-read as much as the Ancient Database as they had been able to abscond with on the couch in the evenings and found Lantean lettering suddenly all over the clothing of all of Jenn`s character sketches for a race of magic wielders.

 

“Where did you see those letters?” he asked.

 

“You left your laptop open, it was in one of your files.”

 

“You can’t use them.”

 

“Why not?”

 

Rodney rolled his eyes. “Firstly, they’re classified and I’d get _fired_. Two, your chief mage’s coat says `One continually force feeding the nebula do not purple spot ratchet.`”

 

“Oh,” Jenn said. Then, “You can read them?”

 

Rodney shifted, face pinking slightly. “Yeah. Had to learn.”

 

“Where?”

 

“Classified.”

 

Jenn wrinkled her nose, and Rodney had quickly learned that a wrinkly nose meant _I hate the `C` word_ , so he distracted her with questions about the characters and convinced her to use the mathematical formulae for the velocity of subatomic light for embroidered symbols instead, cause it looked way _cooler_ , and grabbed them both a cold beer from the fridge.

 

And for a while, it was good.

 

* * *

Eight:

 

“God I _hate_ the `C` word!” Jenn said. “Why _can’t_ you talk about it?” Jenn said. “I mean, if you’re off the project... if you’re _here,_ and back in Nevada, and _living with me_... If you’re back it has to be declassified!” Jenn said.

 

“I just _can’t_ ,” Rodney said, and the misery slid lower in his gut. He reached for the bottle of wine, when what he wanted to do was reach for her. Poured a glass. Didn’t bother to savour it.

 

“Your friend John is coming for dinner tomorrow?” Jenn said, getting up, clearing away the dishes, leaving her own wine untouched on the table. Changing the subject, only not.

 

Angry.

 

Rodney’s cat huddled under the chair.

 

Jenn walked into the kitchen, back turned, spine a straight line of carefully controlled fury. “I suppose we’ll spend all night _not_ talking about whatever it is that the two of you did wherever it was that you were, for _three goddamned years_.”

 

“Jenn--”

 

“I _waited_ , and now you can’t even _tell me_?”

 

The sound of breaking dishes in the kitchen had Rodney swaggering to his feet. Jenn was on her knees on the tile floor - _chocolate on her lips, dead brownies but oh, god, her mouth there, yes yes_ – clutching her hand. It was bleeding, a long wide gash on her palm.

 

Panicking and drunk, Rodney tapped the side of his head, forgot that he had no radio, no Carson waiting in the med bay, no Atlantis. He jammed his finger into his own ear by mistake. “Ow, _shit_ ,” he said and dropped down onto his knees beside her.

 

He took her hand between his wide, warm, blunt ones, pulled the relatively clean dishtowel off the handle of the fridge, and pressed it to the cut.

 

“It’ll need stitches,” he said. “I’ll get the car keys.”

 

“I think you should move out,” Jennifer replied.

 

* * *

 

Nine:

 

Moving out wasn’t a problem. Rodney didn’t have that much stuff.  Rodney has learned to pack light.  Rodney had some laptops and some clothes and Mr. Jinx’s dish and litter box.  He was gone before she got back from the hospital.   Rodney stole her little Lt. Commander Data figurine from on top of her playstation and wiped out the thumbprint that was still there in the dust.

 

Rodney moved into the barracks of the base. They gave him a VIP suite. It was still grey.

He put the figurine on his bedside stand. The Rodneysaur picture, which somewhere between Pegasus and Jenn’s apartment had acquired a frame, went into the bottom of his underwear drawer.

 

A memento reminding Rodney that once someone had loved him enough to make something for him. Back before he had fucked it all up like he always fucks it up.

 

Rodney threw himself into his life at Area 51. Rodney had work to do. Rodney had a Nobel Prize to win.    He called John every other hour because even though he was surrounded by people (sycophants), Rodney was so very damned alone.

 

John made jokes, and Rodney laughed, and when he hung up the phone the empty space in his chest where Jenn used to live burned and froze all at once.

 

He drank every night.

 

He drank too much. He knew that.

 

Killing valuable brain cells. _Pop, pop, pop,_ he could almost hear them with every swallow he took. _There goes unified string theory. There goes the power conversion ratio between Atlantean and Wraith battery cells. There goes Zelekna’s first name._  


 

_Pop, pop, pop._

 

_There goes Jenn._

 

* * *

 

Ten:

 

Rodney smiled and pretended not to hurt over dinner with Elizabeth and Carson and John. _I’m fine, I’m fine_ , he told himself. He picked up his soup bowl, brought it to him mouth, because Jenn told him that he always spilled soup on his lapels and she –

 

  
_Fuck_.

 

_People break up with other people all the time. Simon dumped Elizabeth because she was keeping the same secret. Look at Liz. She’s fine. Fine, fine._

 

_I’ll get over it._

 

Then phones rang and things started moving, and suddenly Rodney needed somewhere for Mr. Jinx to go again.

 

So he got himself rip-roaring drunk (liquid courage), and let himself into Jenn’s apartment with the key that she hadn’t made him leave behind because he hadn’t waited so she _couldn’t_. Rodney put Mr. Jinx’s litter box in the bathroom and his food dish on the kitchen floor and a note on the table that said, “If I could, you’d be the first person I’d tell. I’ve gone back. They need me. I’m sorry.” He turned and walked away from the table, then turned back: “PS – I hope your hand is okay.   You’ll be drawing again in no time.”

 

He left the Lt. Commander Data figurine on the table by the note, the spare key hanging off his stiff plastic hand. Beside it Rodney left the drawing of the Rodneysaur, still in its frame, with a chocolate thumbprint in the bottom left corner.

 


End file.
